


The Days Inbetween

by RebeccaStevenTaylor



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-07-21
Packaged: 2020-07-10 04:44:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19900039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RebeccaStevenTaylor/pseuds/RebeccaStevenTaylor
Summary: What happened in the Days Inbetween the ones we saw inscreen - including the day after the end of the world





	The Days Inbetween

The Days Inbetween

**Somewhere in Wales, 1432**

  
It was cold. Damp and cold and thoroughly miserable. Wind whistled through every gap in the little stone hovel that served as a pub in this village. The ale was vile. The smell of pig manure behind the hovel was vile. The food was beyond vile. Aziraphale, an angel, a principality, shining being of light and goodness was miserable and hated everything right now.

  
Well, almost everything. There was a familiar voice swearing at the weather outside. Aziraphale followed the voice.

  
'Crowley?'

  
A darkest demon of the night, hell incarnate and wicked through and through, turned round and grinned.

  
'Aziraphale! What are you doing here?'

  
'Come in, my dear chap, you'll be soaked,' Aziraphale said, gesturing him inside. 'The rain never seems to stop. What a coincidence you turning up here.'

  
Hmm, yes, what a coincidence, Crowley thought. As if he didn't occasionally pop in on the angel to see what he was up to, and occasionally demonically miracle himself to the right place, just under his window, where he could hear his plans and occasionally spend whole days just discreetly following Aziraphale around. Of course I do, he told Beelzebub, I have to see what the angel is up to. Of course I do, he told himself, I have to see the angel.

  
They sat down opposite each other, as close to the tiny fire as possible. Crowley blew into the fire and it sparked up, finally blasting out some warmth. Aziraphale smiled his thanks – don't say thank you, never say thank you, because if they, heaven or hell, hear an angel and demon exchange thanks, there'll be words.

  
'I've got a miracle to do,' Aziraphale said. 'A poor widow is about to find a pot of gold, and come here to sell it. She's just finding it now. I'm here to make sure the man gives her a very good price.'

  
'Ah,' said Crowley. 'Well, the man she is selling it to is going to use the gold to buy weapons to start a rebellion, tempted by me.'

  
'You mean, we're working on the same man?'

  
'Sounds like, it, doesn't it?'

  
'What a waste of effort,' Aziraphale said. 'Makes you wonder what they're up to.'

  
'Mmm,' Crowley said. 'It's a waste of resources. It really only needs one occult being to do this.'

  
'I'm not occult, I'm ethereal.' Aziraphale looked round at the horrible little pub. He had nice warm rooms in London, and a very acceptable bottle of wine and books to read. He wanted to be home. 'Angels and demons shouldn't do each other's work,' he said, trying very hard to sound convincing.

  
'Why not? It's all God's plan, isn't it? I mean, in the end, it's all working for the Almighty, isn't it?'

  
Well, that was the irrefutable argument Aziraphale had been waiting to hear. He had no actual problem with the idea of the two of them working together, he just needed to be talked into it. It's not as if anyone was paying attention. Millennia he had been on this planet, and the only immortal being who ever checked was he doing all right, had he heard the latest news, wasn't this plague awful was Crowley.

  
'It would save time, I suppose if one person did both. Is tempting very hard?'

  
'Not hard at all,' Crowley said. Except when it came to Aziraphale, who apparently needed centuries to be tempted into the slightest little deviation from the Almighty's plan, even though Crowley knew perfectly well Aziraphale had doubts, and had done since the beginning. Giving away a flaming sword – that was when Crowley knew. Such a good angel, so nervous, so unsure, directly contradicting the word of God like that. All the other angels were so smoothly certain they were absolutely right. Aziraphale's uncertainty was very appealing.

  
Well, adorable. Crowley was never one to lie to himself. It was adorable and if Crowley was going down the 'let's not lie to myself' route he was going to have to admit he fell in love there and then.

  
Now all he had to was persuade Aziraphale to love him back.

  
'I suppose,' Aziraphale said slowly, 'if I want to make sure he doesn't cheat the widow, I need to keep an eye on his temptation.'

  
Crowley only grinned, that infuriating wicked grin that Aziraphale ought to have found annoying but instead he found curiously attractive. Wasn't it odd, the way Crowley just turned up everywhere? Strictly speaking, they were supposed to keep an eye on each other, and thwart each other's wiles but also were supposed to avoid each other. If they ever met, if they ever noticed each other existed, they were supposed to fight each other in a battle of fire and ice, stretching across the eons, until the end came for someone in a fiery doom.

  
But Aziraphale really didn't have time for that. He had books to read. Besides, Crowley was such a pleasant chap to spend time with. He had been very understanding about Aziraphale's problems in the past, and when you're the only two immortal beings on the planet (probably) it made sense to get together and compare notes and chat about the way everything just kept changing.

  
Of course Angels didn't fall in love. Celestial beings were above that kind of thing. Love, of a pure kind, was reserved for the Almighty. So of course he didn't feel special when he was with the demon. He didn't feel especially happier than at other times, or feel relaxed or feel a little tingle when Crowley looked at him or spend hours staring out of his window wondering where Crowley was or going over in his head all the times he'd spent with him or just feel like everything was right if Crowley was there. Absolutely not. Time to put his foot down on that sort of thing.

  
And he absolutely, did not, in any way whatsoever, think that Crowley was really very attractive, especially when he smiled at him, because angels did not feel earthly lusts. No. Not possible.

  
Crowley watched Aziraphale broker the agreement to help the widow, who had a small child hanging silently onto her, and was quite surprised that Aziraphale firmly coerced the man into giving her twice as much as originally agreed, and then see him cast a protection over the woman so she would be safe from all thieves – that sort of thing was supposed to be reserved for royalty and knights and saints. Then he watched Aziraphale tempt the man into buying arms for the rebellion. Despite his truly dire Welsh accent (why couldn't the angel do accents?) he softly talked the man into going from a cerebral interest in the rebellion into full on action. It was the innocence of the angel, Crowley decided. He looked like he wouldn't hurt a soul, and of course, he wouldn't, but somewhere beneath all that fluff was some iron.

  
'Well done,' Crowley said, when Aziraphale came back. 'You were splendid.' He poured some water into Aziraphale's cup, who changed it into wine before they tasted a drop. Well, the water was disgusting and had things floating in it. It was a health issue, really. They clinked the drinking cups together.

  
'Don't tell anyone,' Aziraphale said confidingly, 'but that was rather fun.'

  
Crowley looked round and then leaned in close to whisper.

  
'I owe you one,' Crowley said. 'Anything you like.'

  
'Well,' Aziraphale said slowly. 'I'm supposed to be rescuing a child from a burning building. I'm never too keen on fires, they worry me for some reason. I know it's soft….'

  
'Perfectly understandable. I'm the same way about horses. Can't stand the buggers, they always throw me off and try to bite my backside. Fine, I'm happy rescuing a child from a burning building. I think I'll enjoy playing the hero for once.'

  
'Don't get used to it. It's just this one time.'

  
'Oh, of course, of course. Now that's sorted out, let's get out of this dump.'

  
'I wonder…' Aziraphale said, stammering, 'I have a book, at my home, in London. It has a picture of you in it. It's a book of prayers, and you're the snake tempting Eve, of course. I wonder if you would like to see it?'

  
'Yes,' Crowley said, delighted. His wonderful, awkward angel was inviting him home. It was totally against all the rules. One more tiny step onward. 'I'd like to see that.'

**London 1666**

The books ought to have been safe in St Paul’s Cathedral. It was made of stone, after all and all the booksellers in the streets around had stored their precious volumes there as the flames swept closer. But scaffolding had been put up, and that had caught alight and created a heat so intense the stone melted and the books burned. Thousands of them, irreplaceable, fragile paper that now drifted away as ashes on the wind.

  
Aziraphale stood in the churchyard, heedless of the smuts settling on his suit, staring in sorrow at what remained.

  
‘I’m sorry about the books.’

  
‘Crowley,’ Aziraphale said softly. ‘It’s good to see you.’

  
It was. He could talk to Crowley. He would understand. It wasn’t that Aziraphale didn’t care about the people. Or course he did, but books were special to him. The other angels laughed at him, and said he had all the knowledge of the world he needed at his fingertips – all the knowledge they felt he needed, anyway – and why did he need books? They just didn’t understand about stories. They didn’t understand how words on a page could transport him into someone else’s life for a few hours. But Crowley understood. He didn’t read himself, but he never mocked Aziraphale for his love of books. He mocked him for a great deal else, like his style of clothes, but not books.

  
‘I’m glad you’re all right,’ he said to Crowley. ‘I’d heard you were in London, I was worried you would get hurt.’

  
‘Not me, I’m always all right,’ said Crowley, who had spent a frantic day and night running around London making sure that Aziraphale, busily guiding people down to the river and away from the flames, didn’t have a burning house fall on his head. In the process he’d found himself rescuing one or two people and it had made him feel quite good, which was now giving him stomach ache.

  
‘I couldn’t get here in time,’ Aziraphale said, gesturing at the remains of the books. ‘There’s nothing left.’

  
‘You were saving people,’ Crowley told him. ‘You did well. You did exactly what an angel should do.’

  
‘Yes,’ Aziraphale said, turning away from the sight. ‘But sometimes I do want to behave more like a human.’

  
‘Come on, I’ll get you a drink. You’re filthy, by the way,’ he said, blowing some of the smuts off Aziraphale’s jacket.

  
‘I didn’t know you could do that,’ Aziraphale said, his voice still quiet and broken. Crowley took his arm and led him across to the drinking house that had managed to spring up in 24 hours to take advantage of the fire sightseers. A woman ran by, screeching about the Devil burning down the city. Aziraphale stopped, and stared up at Crowley, mutely.

  
‘It wasn’t me!’ Crowley said quickly. ‘It might have been Hastur, he likes a fire. But not me. Believe me. If it had been me, I would have warned you, and given you a chance to get a few of those books out.’

  
‘Really?’

  
His eyes sparkle, Crowley noticed. Is that for me, or the books?

  
‘What you need,’ Crowley said, as he sat the angel down, ‘is a place where you can keep old books safe. Like a bookshop, but with your angelic protection over it. Nothing would burn then.’

  
‘Unless I was discorporated.’

  
‘Well, we’ll just make sure that doesn’t happen.’

  
‘A bookshop,’ Aziraphale said, a smile appearing. ‘What a wonderful idea.’

**London 1793**

  
Aziraphale mooched around his bookshop. It was lovely, just on a corner on that literary area known as Soho. Full of books, most new now, but they’d become old. Fully protected against fire, flood, cold and revolution, as well as bookworm, damp, and over-acquisitive customers. He had a home. He hadn’t had one of those since – well, you couldn’t call Eden a home. And Heaven didn’t quite have that homely feel. No, this was this home now.

  
So why was he restless? Was he hungry? He still had the box of chocolates Crowley had given him on the desk. Well, the box was left, the chocolates had been eaten long ago. It had been so lovely, seeing Crowley turn up with the chocolates and the flowers – but Gabriel had been there and threatening to send him back to Heaven and Crowley had nipped out and caused the most enormous commotion in the street, everyone screaming at each other, horses galloping, carriages falling to bits in the street. He’d even written ‘Crowley was here!’ in large red letters across the coffee shop opposite just to make sure Gabriel got the point. Then Aziraphale had sorted it all out and made the point that Crowley was still wily and needed to be thwarted, so he stayed in his bookshop.

  
But Crowley had kept away. Not surprising really, if you think about it. If angelic forces were going to pop up regularly in Aziraphale’s bookshop, it was best if Crowley wasn’t there. But Aziraphale was forced to admit – he missed the demon. Crowley made him laugh, and never made him feel awkward or out of place. He could be happy or angry or moody or silly with Crowley and he never once felt like it was the wrong thing to do and he missed that.

  
He did hope Crowley hadn’t got himself killed. He’d bet Crowley was over in that revolution in Paris. Of course Aziraphale could never go over there. Not even for crepes. He did love crepes. He wanted crepes. He missed crepes.

  
He glanced down at himself. Well, he couldn’t go to Paris dressed like this. He looked completely aristocratic. He’d get arrested and put in the Bastille. Of course he could escape, but he wasn’t supposed to be performing miracles and it wasn’t as if Crowley would show up magically to rescue him…

  
Would he?

  
Slowly, a smile that could only be called ever so slightly demonic spread across the angel’s face. He would go to Paris. He would go in full aristocratic wear – he had standards, after all (he added a little extra silver to the coat, just to be sure) and he would find those delicious, delectable, demonic, crepes.

**London 1941**  
Aziraphale got into the car, clutching the bag of books. Crowley waited for him to settle in, and then sped off, ninety miles an hour through blackout streets.

  
Nearly a hundred years without speaking. Now what?

  
‘How have you been?’ Aziraphale ventured.

  
‘Oh, you know. Busy.’

  
Pining, yearning, sleeping, not sleeping because he dreamed, sleeping because he dreamed, pining a bit more, yearning, kicking himself for not explaining better, that he wanted holy water so he could stay with Aziraphale, not leave him.

  
‘You?’

  
‘Also busy. I learned to dance! Well, the gavotte. And magic! I learned to do magic tricks. And I’ve been working with British Intelligence. Or at least what I thought was British Intelligence. And doing a bit of work helping people in the Blitz.’

  
And not think. Far too busy to think. And not wonder where Crowley is. And discover there are humans who feel just as out of place and awkward as I do in Heaven and they find themselves people and places that they do fit in with and is this where I fit in, with you?

  
An angel and a demon. It’s wrong. it shouldn’t be. But for the first time in ages I feel – at peace.

  
‘I was wondering – do you want a drink? At the bookshop? It’s perfectly safe.’

  
‘Is it? Good.’

  
Well, of course Crowley knows it’s safe. He’s spent hours hanging around the bookshop, in the café opposite. He can see the protection on it, it glows like gold. And night after night he sees Aziraphale, restless and reckless, come out of the shop and head down to the fires where London burned. He walks straight into the flames even though he knows he is not untouchable, he can be discorporated, and he works with ARP wardens (careful to cover his clothes in a boiler suit) and he works in the soup kitchens and he works in the hospital and night after night he comes back with his face filthy, utterly exhausted and yet still he would not rest. There’s no dancing now, no magic, not even time to read. He just goes on and on, and then a month or so ago he got involved with what he thought was British Intelligence and Crowley knew perfectly well wasn’t and started playing a game he didn’t quite understand and Crowley knew it was time to step in. Aziraphale couldn’t actually send him away if he was rescuing him, could he?

  
Finally, he has his angel back. He is going to be very careful not to lose him again.

  
‘A drink sounds good, angel. Do you still have some of that champagne?’

  
‘Of course, my dear.’

  
The Bentley speeds through the darkened streets, through the ruins and the fires and the desperation, carrying two men who look far too happy to be caught up in any war.

**11 years ago**

  
Shit. Shit shit shit. The Armageddon? Now? Well, yes, it is the right time, but neither of them have been keeping track. They’ve been going happily along, having a drink every year or so, popping up to hand over the odd temptation or blessing to each other, just calmly living their lives and above all – not going too fast.

  
Well, time’s crept up on them now, hasn’t it? 11 years. 6000 years of yearning and he has 11 years now left with the angel. And save the world, obviously, of course.

  
Well, of course, obviously. Because this world is the only place where an angel and a demon could be together. Because if it’s war, they’ll have to fight each other, perhaps face-to-face and even if they avoid that, at the end it’s Heaven or Hell and all the other lot dies.

  
And this world has books (which Aziraphale loves) and alcohol and movies and cartoons and clothes and music and St James Park and Saturday afternoons eating ice cream at the bandstand and a million things that will be lost.

  
He can only hope the angel sees it that way. Crowley has no problem betraying Hell – it’s Hell, he’s a demon, it’s kind of part of the job package to betray. But Aziraphale has always insisted, against all evidence – against his own inclinations – that Heaven is good and must be obeyed and to turn against Heaven would be the very worst thing he could ever do. They’ve battered his soul into submission with constant messages that they are the good guys, and everyone else is evil and if Aziraphale questions them for a second he is also evil and they will disown him. Aziraphale longs to be a good angel and do his duty.

  
Still, they’ll have to work together. That’s every day, not just every month or so. Every day meeting and planning and arranging and plotting and drinking…

  
Ok, it’s quite twisted to use the upcoming Armageddon and the destruction of the Earth and everything on it to get closer to the angel – but he’s a demon, twisted is what he does. And anyway, he does genuinely want to save the world. He’d just like to save the world side by side with his angel. What's the point of a world that doesn't have Aziraphale in it?

**The Night After the End of The World**

  
Crowley's route home always involved driving past the bookshop. Thankfully, he remembered just in time to tell the bus driver to avoid it. Aziraphale stared out at London, hardly able to believe it was still there. He was holding onto Crowley's hand too, also as if he couldn't believe Crowley was still there. He had taken it as soon as they had sat down in the bus and hadn't let go. Crowley, hardly daring to believe it was happening, didn't say a word. He didn't want to break the spell.

  
'I thought you said the M25 burned?' Aziraphale said, as they went round it.

  
'It did,' Crowley said. 'Great wall of fire.'

  
'Seems fine now.'

  
'Well, Adam reset reality. Maybe that includes the M25.'

Aziraphale had never been to Crowley's flat. They always met at his bookshop. Crowley's flat wasn't like that at all. It was all cold and grey, with one very uncomfortable looking throne. It looked like someone's idea of what a demon's flat ought to look like, instead of home, as if Crowley were trying to remind himself what he was.

  
'There's food in the fridge,' Crowley said. Aziraphale nodded, and went off to the kitchen. He could find the kitchen in any home. Crowley leaned on the table, and looked around him, seeing the flat through Aziraphale's eyes. He didn't like it. Crowley didn't like it. Every once in a while, he would fall asleep on the sofa in Aziraphale's shop. He would wake up to find the angel had draped a blanket over him, and made coffee and muffins for breakfast, keeping them hot until Crowley woke up. That was a home. This – this was a place to keep his plants and his answering machine and that chalk drawing of the Mona Lisa Crowley had blagged off Da Vinci. And even the answering machine only ever got messages from Aziraphale. This was just the place Crowley killed time until it was late enough in the morning to phone Aziraphale.

  
Aziraphale stared at the full fridge. Sushi, rolls, ice cream – everything he loved to eat.

  
'This fridge is full!' he called out. 'I thought you didn't eat.'

  
'You do.' Crowley called back.

  
Forty years ago, Crowley had handed Aziraphale his rescued books and Aziraphale had felt a huge wave of love rush though him. I love him, he'd thought, I love Crowley, I love Crowley, and he loves me.

  
And then, as it often does, once the moment was over, self-doubt crept in. Yes, he loved Crowley. Always had, now he came to think of it. But Crowley – Crowley was a demon. They didn't love. They couldn't love. Crowley, he was sure, was teasing and tempting for fun. Even when he gave Crowley the holy water and Crowley had given him that look, he had thought 'this is too fast. I can't be sure. It could all be different for him tomorrow. Demons don't feel like this. I can't be sure. I just can't be sure he'll feel like this tomorrow.'

  
And then forty years of doubt, and watching Crowley and trying not to give into the temptation to spend every minute, every second with him, because angels and demons belonged apart, didn't they? They were hereditary enemies, weren't they? So forty years of trying to keep that love under control, and he almost had it, he almost had it shut into a box and locked away and then they went to Tadfield. He felt that love there, and the box inside had crumbled to dust and he remembered – acknowledged, that he loved Crowley. But he still hadn't been quite sure…

  
Well, today had proved Crowley did care, didn't he? And now – a fridge freshly stocked of all the food Aziraphale liked to eat, just in case.

  
Aziraphale felt loved.

  
He went back into the other room. Crowley was leaning against a table, his head down, looking broken. Of course, his friend had died today, hadn't he? Aziraphale walked slowly around the room, looking at the throne – very uncomfortable – and the Mona Lisa – surely that was an original – and glimpsing the plants through the door – they looked very luxuriant, Crowley must take a great deal of care of them – and then stopped in front of Crowley.

  
'I'm sorry about your friend.'

  
'Friend?' Crowley looked up.

  
'Earlier – you said you lost your best friend? And when I rang you said you were with an old friend so...'

  
'You!' Crowley took off his glasses and threw them over his shoulder. He never needed to hide his eyes from Aziraphale anyway. 'I meant you! I went to your bookshop. It was on fire and you weren't there. You were dead and I gave up, I gave up on everything, the humans, the world, anything. It could all go to Hell as far as I was concerned if you weren't there.'

  
'Oh, my dear,' Aziraphale said, but words were inadequate when he remembered how Crowley had looked earlier, crying even, in utter bits, more devastated than Aziraphale had ever seen him, and it had all been for him, Aziraphale. He had no idea he could be loved that much. He didn't know what to say but humans – he'd seen humans take a great deal of comfort from physical touch. He reached out and awkwardly put his arms around Crowley. Crowley didn't hesitate. He wrapped his arms around Aziraphale and pulled him towards him, clinging onto him tight, and it wasn't awkward anymore. It was just the way they had meant to be.

  
Why on earth, Aziraphale thought, hadn't he done this years ago? This – this touch was what he needed. He knew Crowley loved him, and he loved Crowley.

  
Crowley buried his face in Aziraphale's shoulder. Demons didn't cry, but they didn't love either and right now Crowley loved and cried. He cried for all he had lost, that burning pain when Aziraphale had gone, and that headlong charge to get back to him, wherever he was, and how much he had wanted for 6000 years to stop loving this angel and yet he never had, not even at the bandstand and he was going to burn that bandstand down.

  
Aziraphale held on, just as tight. Love, this was love. Not what Gabriel and the other idiots called love, which was ice and pain and loss. This was love, all warmth and hope.  
Aziraphale, acting on instinct – something he was learning to do now – kissed Crowley softly on the top of his head. Crowley looked up, and Aziraphale kissed him very lightly on the lips.

  
'What was that?' Crowley said.

  
'Its…it's a kiss. Humans do it to show affection. I wanted to show you that – that I care. Did I do it wrong?'

  
'That wasn't a kiss.' Crowley stood up. 'This is a kiss.' He pulled Aziraphale towards him by the lapels and kissed him full on the mouth, hard. Aziraphale melted. Oh yes, this was a kiss! He could feel the heat in it all the way down to his toes. This was wonderful! This was the best thing in the world! This was even better than crepes!

  
Crowley let go and watched his angel. Had he gone too fast?

  
'Yes...well…Aziraphale said breathlessly. Then he reached up and pulled Crowley towards him and kissed him again.

  
Crowley had imagined kissing Aziraphale, of course. Imagination was not a patch on reality. This – this was real. This was more than he had ever imagined. It was perfect.  
The kiss stopped eventually, as kisses always do, even if neither party strictly has to breathe.

  
'Well,' Crowley said. 'That was worth waiting 6000 years for.'

  
'All that time?' Aziraphale said.

  
'All that time, angel, I have loved you. Did you never know?' Crowley asked.

  
'No, I never guessed, not once. I didn't think you could – not you. I mean, not for me.'

  
'Not once? Not even when I turned up at the ark and made you tell me all about it even though I already knew? And when you asked me to make people come and see Hamlet and I made everyone in the world forever see it? The Bastille? Saving your books – come on, you must have known when I saved your books. Look, I've even got a memento of that, I took the statue from the church and kept it, it's over there.'

  
'So it is, I thought it looked familiar. I think I did know. But I was very unsure. And I was quite scared of what Heaven would say. I needed time to think.'

  
'Well, you had it. 6000 years I've been mooning about over you and you never noticed a thing. What about you?' he asked hopefully. Aziraphale stood back, and straightened his tie, and the rumpled collar of his coat and thought very long and hard.

  
'I thought it started in 1941,' he said. 'But now I think that's just the moment when I knew I loved you. I think, perhaps, I'd been feeling something before. But I'm afraid I was very stupid about the whole thing. You see, I thought I owed Heaven my allegiance and my loyalty when they didn't deserve it all.'

  
'Doesn't matter now,' Crowley said. 'Armageddon's gone, we've got the rest of time to make up for it.'

  
'Ah, well, you see,' Aziraphale said, walking round the table. 'I'm not so sure we have. I don't think they will let us get away with it.' He stopped at the stain on the floor by the door. 'What's this?'

  
'Holy water,' Crowley said. 'I used it to get rid of Ligur. What do you think they'll do?'

  
'Holy water?' Aziraphale said. He was very still, his hands clasped tightly behind him. 'The holy water I gave to you?'

  
'Yes, that's the one. I told you I needed protection. It doesn't bother you, does it?'

  
'No. He deserved it. As long as you weren't hurt.' Aziraphale walked away and back to Crowley, reaching out and taking his hand. It still felt very precious to him that he could do that. 'I think they'll punish us. We can't be seen to get away with defying Heaven and Hell. And we can't be allowed to talk about it, ever. It will give others ideas.'

  
'Ah, yes,' Crowley said, slumping down on the table. 'They've always been very against ideas. Maybe a trial, and definitely a guilty verdict.'

  
Aziraphale looked over at the holy water stain. That demon had melted away into nothingness.

  
'If they take you to Hell, and find you guilty, is that…that what they'll do to you?'

  
'I imagine so,' Crowley said, taking Aziraphale's other hand. He really didn't want to think about this. If there was only one night left, he wanted to make it the best night of his life.

  
'I know what Heaven would do to me,' Aziraphale said. 'I heard them talk about it once. Hellfire.'

  
'Hellfire?' Crowley said, and he went cold. Hellfire. His angel, burning. If they touched him, Crowley would destroy them all, every angel in Heaven. But then what? What would be the point of anything after that?

  
'I was thinking about Agnes Nutter's last prophecy on the bus,' Aziraphale said.

  
'That's what you thinking about?' Crowley was rather annoyed that Aziraphale had been thinking about anything other than him.

  
'Choose our faces, she said. Well, what if I had your face and you had mine? Holy water won't hurt me.'

  
'There's a lot more they could do to you, angel, if they catch you down there pretending to be a demon.'

  
'Well, they won't, will they? Not if I'm convincing. I could learn to swagger like you…'

  
'I really don't think you could.'

  
'Well, could you learn to behave like me?'

  
'I've been watching you for 6000 years, I can manage fiddling with my tie.'

  
'Well, that's it, that's what we should do, we should swap and take each other's places. We have to learn to be each other.'

  
'It'd never work. They'd know. If this is our last night together, is this how you want to spend it?'

  
'Yes!' Aziraphale cried out and dropped Crowley's hands. 'It has to work. Because I don't want just to spend one last night with you, I want to spend all of eternity with you! So teach me how to swagger!'

  
It was a long night. About half way through, Crowley pointed out that if Adam was rebuilding reality, perhaps the bookshop would come back? And Aziraphale said maybe the Bentley would be returned too. And so it was decided that was where they'd start from in the morning, where they were expected to be, so the agents of Hell and Heaven could track them and catch them and get it all over and done with. Then they went back to Aziraphale telling Crowley what to expect in Heaven and Crowley teaching Aziraphale the names of all the demons and if once in a while they stopped to hold hands and kiss, again and again, and hold each other tightly, who can blame them?

**The Start of the Rest of their Lives.**

Well, of course it worked. And if God had a little hand in that – well, her ways are ineffable.

  
Aziraphale had been terrified – not so much what they do to him if they discovered him, they'd probably draw the line at killing an angel and bringing the wrath of Heaven down on them, but what they'd do to Crowley if they found out. He was rather surprised they didn't. Perhaps he had learned to swagger after all. But what about Crowley? Angels would not draw the line at killing a demon. But, in the end, he'd really rather enjoyed being Crowley. He'd especially enjoyed the look on Michael's face when he had asked for a towel.

  
Crowley was furious. They weren't even giving Aziraphale a trial! They just tied him to a chair and then – death. He was being all nice and sweet like Aziraphale was to everyone and that had always made him melt. Them – Gabriel and the others – bastards! They just ordered him to die. It had been his absolute pleasure to spit hellfire at them.

  
And then the fear came. Sitting on a garden bench in Berkeley Square, waiting. Aziraphale had been late, and Crowley passed the time imagining all the different ways he could kill Gabriel and then Beelzebub. And then himself. He wasn't living without Aziraphale. And after last night – they had a life together to live now. It wouldn't be fair for it to be over after 6000 years of waiting. Surely God wouldn't allow that. If she had planned all this from the beginning, surely she wouldn't separate them now.

  
Well, of course she did. She separated lovers all the time. But here he was, sauntering – actually sauntering across the square, looking anxiously around him until he saw Crowley stretched out on the bench.

  
'Holy water, like you said,' Aziraphale said, sitting down, perfectly upright. 'Bought by Michael too. Looks like they're co-operating when getting rid of us.'

  
'Hellfire,' Crowley said. 'They had a bit of a shock when I enjoyed it. I tell you what, I really don't like that Gabriel.'

  
'No, neither do I really. In fact, I'd be perfectly happy if I never went back to Heaven again.'

  
'I've no intention of going back to Hell, I can tell you.'

  
They dined at the Ritz and toasted to the world and to each other. Aziraphale talked and talked, about anything he wanted to, and never once felt awkward or unwanted. Crowley listened intently and never once took his eyes off his angel. And then they went home, hand in hand, angel and demon, on their own side, to spend eternity together.

  
THE END


End file.
